From zcapr59@ucl.ac.uk Mon May 26 04:08:39 1997 Subject: All that's left (1/1) by Nessie From: "Nessie" -------- TITLE: All that's left AUTHOR: Nessie E-MAIL: zcapr59@ucl.ac.uk DISTRIBUTION: Anywhere, just keep Nessie as the author SPOILERS: Irresistible, Pusher Jose Chung's, Momento Mori, Gethsemane RATING: R CONTENT: Graphic descriptions of decomposition, and extreme Scullyangst. CLASSIFICATION: V, A SUMMARY: Give Scully some time alone with Mulder's corpse.. DISCLAIMER: CC owns the characters in the story. Though what he'd want with the Mulder I have here, I dunno.. ABOUT THIS STORY: I've never written a proper angst before, and it's very different from anything else I've done. This was going to be humour-angst, but it just sort of took on its own direction. It *is* pretty gruesome. Don't expect anything pleasant. And by the way, I don't claim to know anything about how bodies decay. ALL THAT'S LEFT. by Nessie The mere action of walking into the morgue, twisted her stomach into knots. Just knowing what lay in there.. *who* lay in there. How many times? she asked herself. How many times, Dana Scully, have you walked so coolly and professionally, into a room like this- no nonsense whatsoever, and sliced shamelessly and calmly into not only human cadavers, but those of the unimaginable. Mutants; bodies which had decomposed abnormally, or were filled with the most hideous thing.. parasitic worms even. Most of the bodies she had examined post-mortem, had suffered some kind of horrific death, the cause of which only hovered on the borders of extreme possibility. And she prided herself on her ability to handle such cases with such detachment. In forensic pathology, it came with the territory. There had been times when she had over-empathised with the victim. The case involving Donnie Pfaster, was one which stood out in her mind. She had learned from that incident- that she could not allow her worst fears to take over. And Mulder had helped her through that. "Mulder...." She realised that she had spoken his name aloud; it echoed around the bare room and came back to her, the reverberations playing back on her ears. A lump rose in her throat and she swallowed. She crossed her left arm across her stomach, and began to bite nervously on the fingernails of her right hand. Not that there was much left of them. Over the last few days, ever since that fateful day, she had started to chew at her nails, fiddle incessantly with her hair- and that was barely the start of what those few days had been like. She felt like the mere shadow of who she had been before. And it was growing. All the time, her tumour was increasing in size, a ticking timebomb, threatening all the time to break through- Ticking timebomb. Of insanity. That was how the author Jose Chung had described Mulder. God, that seemed like a lifetime ago.. And how right he had been. Funny, how this total stranger, who had barely met Mulder- had recognised this almost instantly. Whereas she, Scully- Mulder' *best friend* for gods' sake, never saw it. Until now. And it was a little too late now to be holding him back from the danger of his own mind. Saving his ass like on countless occasions before. For he lay before her, naked and exposed on the autopsy table. Dead. She had requested this duty; it had been reluctantly handed over to her after much insistence on her part that she *had* to be the one to do this. She was his partner; it was her duty to do this. And more. She owed it to him, and knew that he wouldn't have wanted anybody else to do this- to find out the exact reason he died. Gunshot wound to the head, obviously. But she couldn't be sure that it *had* been self inflicted, or if it was, that he hadn't been drugged. For, despite his psychological state lately, she had never expected him to do this. She lifted back the sheeting that covered the body, and sucked in a deep breath, closing her eyes momentarily before continuing. Her gaze travelled the length of his body, starting at the pale blue- tinged feet, and working its way up, along his slender form, eventually to rest upon his head. That beautiful brown hair which she had ruffled affectionately once or twice- and wished she could have done more- was now encrusted with clotted blood from the gaping wound in the side of his head. At least it would've been instantaneous.. at least he didn't choose to make himself suffer any more than this. There were more painful ways to die.. She feebly attempted to console herself, but it didn't work. She didn't think anything would. Nothing was going to change the fact that was staring her in the face, and that lay before her. He was dead, and he wasn't coming back. Ever. She swallowed. Hard. Get a grip, Dana, she instructed herself- attempting to maintain at least some self-discipline and get this done. She turned away from the body, and walked across to the basin. There, she washed her hands, and dried them. She reached for a pair of latex gloves, and began to snap them on. "The truth will save you Scully. I think it'll save both of us.." She stopped sharp, one finger of her glove stretched out, ready to release so that it fit into place. She held it there, as the memory of that moment in the hospital came flooding back to her. He was holding her; her arms were around him, beneath his jacket, and she heard his heart beating right next to her ear. His warmth had cradled her, comforted her, when she needed comforting more than ever. His breath had blown gently through her hair, and she had felt safe. Secure.. like nothing could harm her while she was in his embrace. And now that heart stood still. The breath was no more. All his warmth had faded away, starting from the moment he put that *fucking* bullet in his brain.. destroyed everything with one pull of the trigger. And the security and safety was gone. She was alone in this now. She was exposed to whatever dangers were out there. And all she felt right now was numbness. She couldn't even cry. She hadn't cried since it had first happened. Scully turned and walked back to the table. Thankfully, the eyes were closed. His eyes had always conveyed so much emotion, saying even more than words could.. and she couldn't bear the thought of what he must have been feeling in his last moments. His last moments, Dana. That means there won't *be* any more moments for Mulder. It just didn't get through to her. She held out a hand- a hand that was normally so steady, and now trembled so much. Tentatively, she laid her fingers on his arm. She had been expecting coldness, but still it made her close her eyes and gasp. Yes, the warmth was gone. Rigor mortis was firmly set in. She was well aware of what happened next. It wouldn't be long before decomposition set in. In her mind's eye she saw into the darkness of the coffin in which he would soon lie. The fungi and bacteria in patches of blue, green, white, all over his body; spreading themselves rapidly as they feasted upon his body cells. The eyes rolled upwards already in the sockets, would be among the first to go.. such beautiful hazel pools they were, always so haunted by so much pain... And soon they would be gone; eaten away- the edges of the sockets receding all the time as the face was fed from by the saprophytes that consumed his whole body. Maggots would squirm around in the sockets, gorging their way deeper and deeper into his brain. His full lips would be consumed rapidly, turning that beautiful mouth into a permanent grin. Not a pleasant grin, but the grin of nightmares. The grin of death. The hair is going to fall away, as the skin of the scalp becomes taut and tears open in places, to reveal the bone beneath. And this will happen all across his face. All over him in fact. Skin becoming taut over bone, stretching further and further until it gives way to gaping holes all over his body. Then it's going to peel away slowly, hanging from him in strips, losing the beautiful colour it was in life, taking on a greyness that can only be associated with death. Within him, putrefaction has probably already started. His own body chemicals starting to dissolve the very organs that kept him alive for thirtysix years. Producing fluids and gases that will cause his body to swell; add that to the peeling skin and.. Soon, after the muscle and tendon has gone, all that will be left is bone. Scraps of skin hanging off the sturdy-boned skeleton.. and soon they will be gone too. Scully shook her head. My Mulder.. yes, *my* Mulder.. that's what is about to happen to you. Looking again to the wound in his head, she recalled another moment when he had held a gun to his head. The time with Modell in that hospital room. How easy it had been for him to do that- hold a gun to his own head and pull the trigger. Yet the look in his eyes when Modell had made him pull the gun on *her*.. So why did it surprise her so much that he had gone and done this? She hadn't blamed him at all for the incident, and afterwards when he couldn't bear to look her in the eye, she had reached for his hand and grasped it firmly. Scully could feel that warm hand now, the way it had gently trembled under her touch, revealing how affected he had been by the incident. She felt the warmth of his sweaty palm as she stroked her thumb over it, soothing his fear, rubbing back and forth, and hearing a tiny cry escape him as her fingernail snagged on his skin. The skin came away from his hand in a long strip, and she raised her hand, still grasping his, to examine it in astonishment. As she ran her fingers over his hand again, more skin peeled away. More and more, falling away and landing in a small pile on the floor. It kept on falling, until all she rubbed at was the shininess of bone. She looked down at the skeletal hand which she now held, before the bones dropped to the floor, leaving just the stump of a wrist, which was also disintegrating rapidly. All over him, skin fell away, revealing patches of glistening white bone. Finally, when it seemed that there was no more skin left to fall, he turned his head to face her. The skin only clung in patches on the cheekbones, and just a few tufts of hair remained attached to the scalp. He grinned toothily at her, a grin that could never fade as there were no lips to cover it. But it was the eye sockets that she really noticed. They bored into her soul. No hazel now, just that blackness. It was almost malevolent, the darkness she saw in the place where his eyes should have been. This was before the skeletal remains of what had once been Mulder, collapsed onto the floor, along with the suit that he had been wearing. Tears finally flooded Dana's eyes as she looked upon Mulder, while the images of those white bones still infiltrated through her mind. All that will be left of him.. She reached up to his head, and ran her fingers through his blood- encrusted hair for the last time. She clasped tightly the hand that in her mind's eye had been decaying moments earlier. He was cold, but it was all that she had of him. All that she had of him... She held it tightly while she still had it. Leaning over to lightly kiss his forehead, the tears took over her completely, as she lovingly and desperately embraced his cold, naked body- she knew it was too late to feel that loving returned- to feel anything returned to her at all, but it was all she could do as she wept onto his chest, sobs racking her body. It was a long time before she moved. ==================================== Okay. I know it's depressing, I have no idea what just came over me. I'd love to hear what people think on this one. You can always talk to Morbid Nessie at joest@lineone.net I've written plenty of less morbid stuff, promise! Mail me or check out the Gossamer archive. Nessie :D || ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ the city shimmers above me in a thousand points of light and above it in the stars countless in number but some kind of illion maybe ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ PERSONAL PHILOSOPHY: Every silver lining has a cloud SAYING OF THE DAY: Life is like a sack of potatoes... oh I dunno. Anything potato-ish.